


Til the End

by Leydhawk



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: because they really didn’t in the film, can be taken as Stucky if you want, endgame spoilers, just a couple of old friends talking, or best friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-09 06:12:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18632428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leydhawk/pseuds/Leydhawk
Summary: Another fix-it, solely addressing Steve and Bucky actually talking. You can take their relationship any way you want.





	Til the End

**Author's Note:**

> I’m doing my best after Endgame. I guess we all are. I’m angry and sad and working through it by writing some AUs.

Banner was pestering them incessantly about returning the stones, but Bucky was impressed with the way Steve had somehow developed patience and aplomb in the terrible five years so many people had been gone.

Steve listened to Bruce, nodded, agreed it was the very next thing they’d do, patted the big man’s shoulder, then turned and headed for Bucky. 

“Let’s talk, pal,” Steve said, wrapping an arm around Bucky’s shoulders and turning him toward the lake. The walked for several minutes in silence.

“I want... I want to do so many things with this time traveling ability...” Steve finally confessed. 

Bucky nodded. “But it won’t change this timeline. It’ll just make new ones.”

Steve stopped and Bucky turned to face him, slipping out from under that comfortable weight of Steve’s arm. Steve’s expression was stricken.

“I wanna make it so you never had to endure... That you never even fell. That you never —with Zola—“

“Steve, that’s not possible. Not for me.”

“I know, I just...”

Bucky sighed. “Means a lot you wanna, okay? But you can’t do that to yourself. I’m here. I’m mostly fine. You can’t fix the past.”

“But we did—“

“In this timeline, yeah. In another, ya didn’t. In hundreds more there were other factors that changed things in different ways. Don’t try an figure it all out, Stevie. You ain’t smart enough to understand. Just accept tha—“

Steve laughed and punched him in the shoulder. 

“I’m smarter than you think.”

“Uh-huh.”

Steve started walking again and Bucky fell into step beside him. 

“What would be your ideal timeline?” Bucky asked. 

Steve blew out a deep breath and stuck his hands in his pockets

“I don’t know... No war at all? Keep Ma from getting sick? Us getting married and living next door to each other, raising kids and...”

Steve’s voice dropped off. “Or...”

“Yeah, you wouldn’ta survived to have kids, Stevie. The serum saved you. So that means no Ma, World War II happens—“

“But I coulda saved _you_.”

Bucky sighed. “I wouldn’t be... _me_ , though. I am who I am because all that stuff happened.”

It was like Steve hadn’t heard him. Ramrod straight, Steve pulled up short. “But Peggy...”

Bucky shook his head. “She had a life without you. You gonna make choices for her and take that away? Gonna treat her like she’s your gold medal for saving the universe?”

Steve blanched. “God no! That’s...”

Bucky shook his head. “Sorry, pal. I asked you to think selfish and then punched ya in the gut for it.” He grabbed Steve’s bicep and squeezed briefly. “Really, you can’t undo what she had, you could just make a new reality for you and her. You could...you could do that, after you return the stones.”

Steve turned away, looking out over the water. 

“If I did... I could go and find you. Bet Peggy’d help. We could maybe...make a better world. Actually destroy Hydra. Stop the worst things from the past eighty years. Me an’ you an’ Peggy...”

Bucky wasn’t sure what to say. He had no idea how that world would be. If he hadn’t killed all the people he’d killed, would bad people just make someone else do it? There were billions of variables, everyone’s free wills. It was a pipe dream to think they could fix every wrong everywhere.

Steve apparently came to the same conclusion.

“We can’t really go back.”

Bucky stepped up next to him and rested his hand on the back of Steve’s neck.

“Yeah. It was kinda fun to think about, but...”

“Maybe something more recent: maybe I could save Tony...”

Bucky squeezed and shook Steve lightly. 

Steve sighed. “Gotta give him the dignity of his choice, huh? This _sucks_. It feels like I could do so much good and it just seems like I actually can’t.”

“Yeah.”

They stood that way for a long time. 

 “She was right. We gotta start over. Do our best from here on out?”

“Think so, Steve. She was one smart gal.”

Steve turned his head and looked at Bucky. Those familiar blue eyes searched, and Bucky did his best to drop his guard and just let Steve... _see_. 

Steve pulled him into a hug. “Til the enda the line,” he mumbled into Bucky’s shoulder. Bucky held tighter. 

“Damn right.”

**Author's Note:**

> I’m Leydhawk on tumblr too if you wanna come commiserate there.


End file.
